Maternal and Child Care Services
In order to ensure positive maternal health outcomes it is important to provide adequate reproductive health service and education to avoid unwanted pregnancy and unsafe abortions and teenage pregnancy. This study has provided information regarding the effectiveness of program and services for improving maternal and child health which could help to build awareness regarding pregnancy and reproductive health and positive health outcomes for child as well, thus, it can be said that the study is relevant for this assignment.
The study has aimed to review the existing programs for maternal and child care to understand the current evidence and develop maternal and child health service while recognizing the future research priorities. In this regards the authors have used systematic review and included 23 previous researches from 2003 to 2012. 52% publication have reported about programs and service out of aboriginal community which has demonstrated inadequate and unequal maternal and child health service in the population. Most of the study has identified antenatal and post natal care as the intervention to improve maternal and child care in the population, hence indicated lack of reproductive health service for reducing unwanted pregnancy or teenage pregnancy. Thus, the study has recommended health promotion through education as an effective intervention, which could help the people to understand the issue of unwanted or teenage pregnancy and could create awareness within the population and improve the health outcomes (Jongen et al. 2014).
The authors have identified effective programs and intervention to improve the maternal and child care in an effective if implemented properly and the interventions have informed the nursing practice to improve the primary health care strategies in order to improve the maternal and child care in aboriginal and Torres strait Islander. However, there are some significant gaps in the documentation and implementation of maternal and child health service programs which can be considered as the weakness of the study. Nevertheless, the limitations could be modified with further research focusing on the effective process of documentation and implementation of such programs. Hence, it is demonstrated that the study has aimed to reduce the discrimination in health service for the aboriginal people as the intervention of promoting health through education could help the population to become aware and access adequate health service which is one of their human rights (Humanrights.gov.au 2018). Thus, it can be said that the intervention provided by the study supports human rights of the aboriginal people.
Sexual Assault Services
Sexual assault has been considered as the one of the most potential risk factor of sexual health risk or sexually transmitted disease and the selected paper has provided information regarding the worldview of aboriginal population regarding sexual assault and also reported about the improvement of sexual assault service to introduce effective policies and practice in order to reduce the prevalence of sexual abuse in the population that could reduce the risk of sexually transmissible disease. Due to such significance of the study the article has been selected for this assignment.
The author has aimed to explore the importance of promoting cultural safety through the improvement of sexual assault service. In this regards the author has focused on the Yarn Up forum that has aimed to bring together the service providers associated with the sexual assault service in order to discuss the challenges in practice and polices in order to introduce effective strategies to improve the service and provide quality service to the Aboriginal and Torres Islander people. The result has indicated that, the aboriginal people are the most surviving community in the world and due to the history of colonization they have faced discrepancy in health and social service. Such disadvantage is associated with the high prevalence of alcoholism, substance abuse and violence. Child sexual assault has been found to be the most prevalent exploitation in the population and lack of understanding about the context and the impact of sexual assault on the health and society has led to the lack of accountability and inadequate resources to resolve the issue. In this regards the author has recommended that promoting awareness through cultural safety would be an effective intervention and the health service providers need to acknowledge the cultural diversity and improve the policy and practice to improve the way of offering of the sexual assault service (Funston 2013).
For a prolong period sexual assault has been neglected thus, created huge scope to address the issue through research in future. The study has utilized the scope of practice related to sexual assault which is major strength. However, the study included only a specific program that has limited the generalizability of the result. Nevertheless, the study has informed about the importance of improving sexual assault service to provide adequate health and social support to the abused people. Such support would help them to access resources and reduce the risk of sexually transmitted disease. Additionally the researchers have adhered the rights of aboriginal people to analyze the social problems and included recommendations to help them to access effective social service which is one of their human right according to Humanrights.gov.au (2018), which reflected that the intervention supports human rights in an effective manner.
Reproductive Health Services
The article is relevant for this study because it has focused on investigating the reproductive health issues of aboriginal and Torres Islander men and evaluate their help seeking behavior in order to get rid of reproductive health issues. The findings could help to understand the reproductive health issues of the selected population and identify the barriers that restrict them to access adequate health service, thus could help to introduce effective strategies in order to address the barriers in an effective manner.
The authors have aimed to evaluate the help-seeking behavior of the aboriginal and Torres islander men that are suffering from reproductive disorders. In this regards the authors have used cross-sectional mixed method within 293 aboriginal men aged 18 years or above. The result of the study has indicated that 10% men under 35 years age and 285 men aged between 55-74 years suffer from erectile dysfunction. In case of moderate to severe chronic condition poor help seeking behavior has been reported in the remote aboriginal areas, especially for the men aged between 40-59 years. About half of the population lack treatment for reproductive disorder. Lack of awareness, shame and culturally unsafe health service have been identified as the most common barriers in accessing adequate health service. Thus, it has been recommended that it is important to provide education health education to the population in order to increase awareness and the health service provides need to acknowledge diverse culture and offer health service which is culturally safe and acceptable for all (Adams et al. 2013).
This is the first study that have included the concern of reproductive health issue of aboriginal males which is the major strength of the study and the it has identified potential barriers that restrict the people to access health service for reproductive disorder which has informed nursing practice to focus on such barriers in order to introduce effective strategies such as health education and culturally safe health service to create awareness and make them understand the importance of reproductive health and well-being. However, the study is limited to small sample size which could reduce the generalizability of the findings. The intervention of promoting culturally safe health service would help to protect the right to distinct status and culture and the strategy to implement health education in order to create awareness would help to protect the right to self-determination to decide the way of addressing their issue. In addition the interventions could help to access equal health service as well, thus it can be said that the interventions provided by the study support the human rights of aboriginal people (Humanrights.gov.au 2018).
Evaluation of the Interventions
The study has focused to identify the contribution of effective maternity service in order to reduce the risk of reproductive health issues as it has been found that the reproductive health is poorer in the indigenous population than nonindigenous people. Hence the study is relevant as it intend to close the gap regarding such health status through the improvement of maternity care.
The study has informed about the issue of poor reproductive health of the people residing in the rural or remote areas. Thus, the study has aimed to investigate the issue in order to introduce effective strategies to improve the reproductive health in this population. The result has reported that 525 women in aboriginal community suffer from worst reproductive health outcomes. The lack adequate health service from skilled antenatal or postnatal service providers. The health practice in this population fails to meet the cultural needs of the people. Hence the authors have indicated that adequate maternal and child mortality data and measurement of insufficient progress need to be measured in order to mitigate the gap between indigenous and nonindigenous health status. The role and responsibilities of the midwives could be improved through comprehensive and collaborative practice in order to provide quality service to the aboriginal women to improve reproductive health and reduce the prevalence of maternal and child mortality. Reorganization of service provision and adequate funding are also recommended to improve the maternity service in the population (Kildea et al. 2010).
The study has effectively identified the gap between the reproductive health status of indigenous and nonindigenous women and introduce significant interventions to mitigate the gap which is the strength of the study. The findings have informed the midwifery nurses regarding their duties to provide equal care to individual and reported that implementing culturally safe practice, promoting collaboration and adequate funding could help them to improve their practice in order to improve the reproductive health of aboriginal women and reduce the maternal mortality. However, the study did not evaluate the interventions thus failed to provide the effectiveness of the interventions which can be considered as the limitation of the study. Nevertheless, the study has provided interventions that may help the aboriginal women to access equal maternity service and live healthy life which is their human right, thus it can be said that the intervention provided by the study support human rights of the population in an effective manner (Humanrights.gov.au 2018).
Conclusion
This study has informed about the effect of sexually transmitted infection program on the rural aboriginal population in Australia which could help to understand about effective infection control program, interventions and their effectiveness to reduce the sexually transmitted disease in order to improve the reproductive health of the population, thus the article is appropriate for the study.
The authors have aimed to evaluate the impact of sexually transmissible infection control program in the rural aboriginal population. In this regards the authors have systematic review method in order to review the reports on sexually transmissible infection programs to evaluate their effectiveness. The result has indicated that age-adjusted chlamydia and gonorrhea have been reduced by 58% to 67% in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) lands of northern South Australia due to the implementation of sexually transmissible infection control program. On the other hand reduction in sexually transmitted disease has been found to be 94% in Ngaanyatjarra Lands of Western Australia. Such result has demonstrated the positive impact of sexually transmissible infection control program on the rural aboriginal people in order to reduce the prevalence of sexually transmissible disease (Guy et al. 2012).
The study has provided adequate evidence regarding the effectiveness of sexually transmissible infection control program with significant data which is the strength of the study. Such information could help the nursing practice to identify the well-organized health program that could reduce the risk of sexually transmissible disease and could help to improve awareness regarding the illness. Hence the findings of the study could help to improve the health status of the rural aboriginal people in Australia with the implementation of proper health program. However the study is limited to some specific areas and the given health status are taken from 1996 to 2005, it means the study did not included current statistics which can be considered as the limitation of the study. The interventions provided by the study has focused on the key issues of aboriginal people and provided strategies that could help to reduce such issues in an effective manner (Humanrights.gov.au 2018). Hence, it can be said that the interventions have considered the human rights of the aboriginal people in an effective manner.
References:
Adams, M. J., Collins, V. R., Dunne, M. P., de Kretser, D. M., & Holden, C. A. 2013. Male reproductive health disorders among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men: a hidden problem. Med J Aust, 198(1), 33-38.
Funston, L. 2013. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander worldviews and cultural safety transforming sexual assault service provision for children and young people. International journal of environmental research and public health, 10(9), 3818-3833.
Guy, R., Ward, J.S., Smith, K.S., Su, J.Y., Huang, R.L., Tangey, A., Skov, S., Rumbold, A., Silver, B., Donovan, B. and Kaldor, J.M., 2012. The impact of sexually transmissible infection programs in remote Aboriginal communities in Australia: a systematic review. Sexual health, 9(3), pp.205-212.
Humanrights.gov.au. 2018. Information Sheet – Social justice and human rights for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples | Australian Human Rights Commission. [online] Available at: https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-social-justice/guides/information-sheet-social [Accessed 6 Oct. 2018].
Jongen, C., McCalman, J., Bainbridge, R., & Tsey, K. 2014. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander maternal and child health and wellbeing: a systematic search of programs and services in Australian primary health care settings. BMC pregnancy and childbirth, 14(1), 251.
Kildea, S., Kruske, S., Barclay, L. and Tracy, S., 2010. ‘Closing the Gap’: how maternity services can contribute to reducing poor maternal infant health outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women. Rural and Remote Health, 10(3). pp. 1-18.